


Piecemeal

by deathwailart



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood Magic, Dark, Dubious Consent, Dubious Morality, F/M, Kidnapping, Magic, Traditions, Witches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-21
Updated: 2013-03-21
Packaged: 2017-12-06 00:24:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/729563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathwailart/pseuds/deathwailart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He'll belong to her, bit by bit, all the old traditions used to bind them tight at the seams forever and always.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Piecemeal

With nimble fingers the feathers are bound, black crow, white dove and pheasant, the long tail plume of a male all bound together with a strip of leather taken from her father's supplies. To the feathers she attaches carved runic tokens, small circular discs cut from a slender branch, the symbols carved deep into the wood. There is a hole at the top of each disc to tie them together so they can be bound to the feathers. The token is tradition and she has taken time to make it beautiful. She spent days collecting the feathers instead of grabbing the first she found, keep a collection in a box to study their form, their colour and size, how soft they were when she stroked them across the skin of her throat, her eyelids, the inside of her arm. One of her father's hunting trips provided the pheasant and she plucked the bird herself, selecting the prettiest of the feathers. Making her coins took longer. She had to wait for lightning and an arc of it cracking down to hit a tree, severing a branch, slim and healthy. After that it was easy; her craft has been passed down to her from her mother, taught to her so young that tradition comes as easily as breathing. All in the blood, mother likes to say, just needs practice to make it perfect.  
  
It's not time yet to hand over her token so she hangs it above her bed with care where it nestles between charms and chimes, all of them clinking, tinkling, swaying. Her dreams will rise to catch in the feathers and his dreams will be full of her when she hands it over, as well as her essence from her touch and contact with her possessions. Like tea it must be steeped long enough so it isn't weak and lacking but if left too long it will turn out overwhelming. Trial and error, mother says, but everyone in the family has done this right first time around and she won't be the first to make a mistake and have to try again. There's a humming in her bones that's been building steadily, louder and louder, it makes her restless enough that she haunts the house at strange hours on tiptoe. She always ends up in the same place. Down the back set of stairs, down again under the basement to a deeper level that's been here for so long that no one really remembers why it was built or the original purpose. It's a spacious room but cold, no modern items permitted. Old things. Old power. Decades of magic in the air from generations gone by, their bones burned and scattered around the grounds, their blood poured into the soil. They all go back to the land that nurtures them to keep them strong for generations to come. Tonight she dreams fitfully, the humming a buzz, a swarm of angry bees in her skull. It means she's getting closer to handing the token over when it becomes unbearable. For now she can stand it even if it wakes her up driving her from her bed to pad barefoot out of her room to see him, a smile on her face, avoiding all the stairs and floorboards that creak on the way. She doesn't want to wake her parents or siblings even if they all understand either from having felt it too or from the knowledge that one day they'll be in her place. She just wants a little time alone with the boy locked away in the oldest, deepest room of the house, the one who'll be hers so soon.  
  
When she opens the door her heart flutters faster as her eyes adjust to the dim light that comes from candles and wall torches, refreshed daily now that Levi has stopped trying to fight or run away. Only blood men are allowed and encouraged to be wild and wilful like her brothers. The others, like her father, are to be devoted to family and their wives, dutiful and obedient. Her boy is quiet now too. Once or twice he tried to run away, barging past whoever opened the door and he was punished with the most terrible nightmares that she soothed him through, tucking his head beneath her chin as she rocked him back and forth crooning lullabies in a low voice. They'd left him in the dark to tremble for days and nights on end when the nightmares stopped and she went to him every night, offering comfort; eventually he gave in, frightened and alone, clinging to her tight and in the morning she let him help her light the candles and torches, smiling at him. It was the first time she saw him smiles, tearful though he was. He doesn't speak much, not like he was at first when he kept asking to be let go, pleading with them saying he'd never tell a soul if they just let him leave. Since he's realised he's going nowhere he's been near silent. Only please and thank you, yes and no to be polite with his gaze on the floor unless someone commands him otherwise. Soon he'll be better, he'll be hers, all wrapped up in each other and no longer locked away in this room when it isn't time for meals or the chores he helps with, always in the house and never alone. She likes when he helps her in the kitchen, hip to hip, stirring and chopping. Or when he comes inside from the garden smelling of sweat and soil as she cups his chin to kiss him chastely on the lips. One day he'll kiss back.  
  
"Hello?" She calls out because she doesn't want to startle him and some nights she is content just to creep over to where he is and pull his head into her lap, stroking his hair as he sleeps sweetly.  
  
"I'm here," he whispers from a corner and she smiles to hear his voice, to hear more than just the pleasantries expected from anyone.  
  
"I couldn't sleep so far away from you," she admits as she joins him in a corner, wrapped up in old blankets to protect him from the chill of the room. No longer is he confined to a cage as he was in the earliest days of his stay after her father and brothers found him wandering on a hunting trip. Lost little lamb locked up for later to be a new son, new blood to keep their family going for the future. "Have you been lonely down here all alone?"  
  
He trembles, shaking like a life as she brushes his hair from his face, "Yes," he says at last, still slow and sluggish with sleep, "it's cold down here."  
  
"One day you'll be upstairs with Lark, snug and warm in our bed, would you like that?"  
  
"Why are you doing this?" He asks and it's almost a sob. She rocks him, kisses the top of his head and wraps them tighter in the blankets to share her heat with him.  
  
"Don't you want to marry me?" It hurts that he doesn't seem to want this still even though she was warned it'd take time. "You'll be so happy with me, I promise - father was like you, look how happy he is."  
  
"Are you going to put a spell on me?" She shakes her head, almost wanting to laugh at such a silly suggestion but at least now he no longer denies the existence of magic.  
  
"Spells like that don't work well, you can't found a family on a lie."  
  
He falls quiet for a while but curls closer to her all the same; it's the longest conversation they've had in weeks and weeks. She wants to kiss him, wants to lie down with him in this old room of power in a blanket nest, warm and cosy but not yet. He hasn't made the choice but soon he'll go back in the cage so she can make sure he sleeps beneath her token. He won't be happy with it but she'll makes sure he does it. She'll sit with him and stroke the inside of his wrists, kiss them too, talk to him about the old way and the power of the land they live on. He has beautiful wrists. It’s not something she’d usually notice but in this instance she does. His wrists are slender, skin smooth under her fingers, the thump of his pulse measured and steady, veins the pale blue of a robin’s eggshell and she holds two fingers flat, pressed against one, thumb on the other side. With his trousers rolled up to his knees she can see his ankles and how they’re the same - boyishly slender and paler than the rest of him. She tucks him in all snug beside her and feels how his heart beats a little faster too. Fear? Or something else. She hopes it's not fear. She's weary of him being so scared of her. She'll teach him all the proper things he needs to know. Her place to teach him, her responsibility, eldest daughter with the lion's share of the magic and an example for her sisters.  
  
"How will I know?" He asks at last, a sheen of tears in his eyes. She knows his conflicted looks so well by now. It's not fear, revulsion or hate in his eyes. This look says he's considering it, considering the future she offers to him.  
  
"You'll know, trust me," she urges, moving so they lie back, using her hold on his wrist to guide his hands to lie against her chest (he blushes and she triumphs, his fingers curl in the fabric of her nightgown and she hides her smile behind her long dark hair) pressing her free hand to his. "I've never hurt you. Trust me, trust me, listen," she chants as the buzz gets louder, ringing in her ears, "just feel, trust me, you'll be so happy, so so happy." A little whimper escapes him but instead of pulling away he moves closer, one of his legs between hers as he twists his wrist free of her grasp to link their fingers together, drawing both their hands closer to his heart. She wonders if he can feel it too, the thing that's in her bones but she doesn't ask, not when this is the most relaxed he's ever been around her, all that ugly tension gone. She sings to him in a high fluttering voice in a language he doesn't understand until he's asleep again, the thump of his heart slow and steady under her palm. It drowns out the wretched buzzing and humming enough that she sleeps too, waking come morning to him shyly stroking her hair back from her face.  
  
She leads him upstairs by the hand to breakfast. Her parents smile at them from either end of the table.

* * *

  
  
After dinner she steals back to her room to make herself presentable. The day has been good with her father and brothers taking Levi hunting. He doesn't catch anything but he comes back with another smile and the fresh air has done him good, putting colour in his pale cheeks. In her room she picks out an old dress she has never worn, lace at the collar, wrists and hem, an heirloom handed down to her. She braids her hair and wraps it around her head like a crown, twining flowers into it. She stays barefoot and goes downstairs and outdoors to walk through the dirt rich with the blood and bones of her ancestors, coating her soles in them, wriggling her toes. She stays there in the gathering dark to ask for their blessings tonight and all nights to come then takes a handful of dirt down to Levi's room. He's still upstairs with her family, being told stories to give her time to prepare. Soft blankets and pillows line the cage and more are draped across it to keep the warmth in. Fresh candles are ready to be lit and in the middle of the room there is an open circle of salt with a bowl and knife in it. She closes the circle once she kneels within it, dropping the dirt in the bowl before wiping her hand on a towel. At all times she is careful not to dirty her dress. Next she takes up the knife, slices through her palm and lets the blood drop into the dirt, stirring it with a finger.  
  
"Take this offering from your daughter," she begins, voice a monotone chant, "her blood, your blood, her bones, your bones. Grant her your blessing to bring another into this family to bring forth more daughters and sons." Twice more she repeats the chant, louder each time until her voice echoes off stone walls so all her ancestors might hear her. She drops her head forward when she's done, breathing hard before rising to her feet, stepping from the circle to hurry back upstairs to wash her hands. When she goes back down he's waiting for her with towels and a basin of hot water set before a chair.  
  
"You've cut your hand," he says once she's locked the door and sat down in the chair with him kneeling at her feet. He takes her hand in one of his, inspecting it with great care until she presses his chin to make him look up.  
  
"For an offering. Will you wash my feet?" Her heart beats wildly. This is as important as any other part. He nods, giving a small smile. What a good boy he is now.  
  
"Were you in the garden?" He asks as he scoots closer, gathering her feet into his lap. She nods, not quite trusting her voice to speak. "Is the water okay? Not too hot?"  
  
"It's perfect, well done." It isn't her imagination that he glows with her praise as he scrubs her feet gently, removing all the dirt from them as he starts to talk about being outside again and how they're going to teach him to hunt properly, still nervous but happy. It's taken time to get him like this but anything worth having requires time and effort. Soon he'll be hers, the fight against them gone.  
  
"All clean." The announcement is followed by him patting her feet dry and when she leans down he meets her halfway so they can kiss. "Can I ask a question?"  
  
"Always," she answers with her lips still so close to his.

"My cage," he begins with equal parts trepidation and reluctance, "I've been good, I'm not going to run Lark, I want-" he pauses, looking up at her with bright eyes, "I want to stay."  
  
It's an honest confession. Oh it's a broken one she knows with his soft voice, all of him fragile as a baby bird but it's what she's been waiting for. Tonight is the night and after this she'll put him back together just the way she wants him.  
  
"I know, I know. But you trust me, don't you?"  
  
"Always," he echoes quickly, squeezing her feet still in his lap. "Always Lark."  
  
"I've made it nice and warm for you, comfortable." As she speaks she rises and leads him by the hand to the cage he hated. "See? I made a gift too, it's taken a long time to get it perfect, just for you, only for you." With her prodding hands she gets him to lie down so he can look up at it as she kneels awkwardly by him. "If you trust me you'll sleep here, you'll stay here. Just a bit longer. You can do that, can't you?" He nods, looking to her for reassurance. "Good boy," she praises then backs out to lock the cage behind her, moving to extinguish the old candles and light new ones, singing softly as she goes. She takes the chair outside then the basin before placing candles all around the circle.  
  
"Sweet dreams," she calls from the door before locking it tight behind her.

* * *

  
  
For the next week he is allowed out only for brief moments, unsteady as a newborn colt and he clutches her hand tight when she leads him anywhere, leaning against her. A week in the cage for most of the day and night and on the last night she lies in there with him, more blood and dirt in the bowl as her family wait for them until finally, the morning after their shared night in the cage, he wakes and tilts her chin towards him saying, "I'm yours, I'm yours, forever and always." She kisses him and unbinds the token, leading him upstairs to hang it once more above her bed that is now theirs and at breakfast afterwards, everyone is all smiles. They clean out the room later then wash and dress to sit together in relative silence as he reads an old, old book with a crumbling spine about her family history, each generation adding to it in their own hand. He asks her about how a mother and father name her children and she tells him how they were named for things that fly, from their mother, and things that grow, from their father. Owl, Lark, Sparrow, Blue Jay, Lyrebird then Burdock, Zinnia, Sorrel, Pansy, Oleander. He only knew her as Lark before and says that Zinnia suits her. She stitches a heart of felt as she explains the traditions, sewing his named deep within it then hers around every vein until they are summoned.  
  
Hours they spend down in what was once his room within a larger circle, mother head of the proceedings, father at her elbow. All her siblings surround them clasping candles and continuing the prayers to the dead and to the things they worship when her mother stops to ask for Levi's arm and heart.  
  
When the blade slices through his flesh she is proud for he does not flinch as blood flows into a pewter bowl, the heart she made being soaked in it. All hers now, every last inch especially his heart and her father pronounces them man and wife. They hold the pewter bowl between them when they kiss, smiling. Ever after he'll be by her side, sharing her bed and her dreams, sewn together with blood and magic until they're given back to the dirt by their children and grandchildren.


End file.
